Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion

Checks and Balances in the Articles for Deletion Nomination Process

There needs to be better checks and balances in the process of how articles are currently nominated for deletion, to prevent notable topics from being deleted without actual qualification per Wikipedia article deletion guidelines. This is a significant problem, because it is very likely that notable topics are being injustly deleted. It's easy to nominate an article for deletion and then type five or six words and wait to see if an article will be deleted, whereas it takes more time to refute nominations. Perhaps there should be more sophisticated criterion to nominate articles for deletion. As it is now, anyone can nominate any article without providing a just rationale for doing so, and can instead simply base the nomination upon basic, generic and inspecific statements such as "doesn't pass general notability guidelines", while not specifically stating which parts of the guidelines they are supposedly referring to. If nobody comes along to correct an injust or baseless nomination, the article is then deleted based upon unqualified, general statements that don't actually correspond with the required source searching per WP:BEFORE prior to nominating an article for deletion. This definitely makes it very easy for people to censor Wikipedia, for whatever subjective reasons. Here's how it's done: an article is nominated for deletion and an AfD entry is created, a generic rationale is provided to misqualify the deletion without actually checking for reliable sources to establish topic notability. Afterward, if nobody comes along to correct the faulty nomination, the article is deleted. It's also easy for people to message one-another to delete articles, often per an "as per nom" rationale, while disregarding the actual notability of topics. If nobody comes along and provides an objective analysis to refute the deletion of an article in which the topic is actually notable, nominated per generic statements and without the required source searching prior to nomination, then the article disappears. Hopefully Wikipedia can introduce better checks and balances to prevent this type of easily accomplished, simple censorship. One idea is to include a requirement prior to article nomination for deletion in which the nominator has to state, or check-box on a template, that they've performed the required minimum search in Google Books and in the Google News Archive required by WP:BEFORE, and in Google Scholar for academic subjects, as suggested in WP:BEFORE. This would be a simple addition to the AfD nomination process that would add significant integrity to the process, and would also encourage users to follow the proper procedures.

Please place responses regarding this matter here on this Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion Discussion page below, rather than on my personal talk page. In this manner, other users can view and respond to responses. Thank you. Northamerica1000 (talk) 06:40, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Addition to the above treatise:, posted September 23, 2011
  

The current AfD process is dependent upon editors being willing to spend their time to disqualify erroneous nominations when they occur. This is concerning, because again, it takes much more time and effort to disqualify faulty nominations than it does to post them. Hence, there is room for improvement to increase checks and balances in the nomination process to prevent stated erroneous nominations from occurring in the first place. I have presented some examples below in this discussion, five in which article's were kept after other editors came along and corrected faulty nominations. These are quite relevant examples of stated hasty nominations that needed correction. If nobody came along to correct the problem, the articles may have been deleted from another person simply voting, for example, "as per nom." In addition, I've included two examples in which articles may have been hastily deleted from Wikipedia.

A significant problem is the ease in which stated hasty nominations occur, versus the time it takes for editors to correct them. Another significant point regards the desire of editors to spend time doing so, spending hours of time to correct stated hasty nominations that take seconds to post. As it exists now, any article can be nominated for deletion in seconds, while researching for the availability of reliable sources takes a considerably greater amount of time. It's very unlikely that a significant amount of editors will want to devote a great deal of their time correcting these types of hasty nominations for deletion, which again, take only seconds to post. Additionally, please refer to two additional examples I provided below about articles that may have been hastily deleted.
Northamerica1000 (talk) 07:30, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

(I have directed the other two pages where you started the exact same discussion to this one, no need to have the same discussion on three different pages) Fram (talk) 07:16, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

As longer as there are no checks and balances for the creation of articles, no more checks and balances are needed for the deletion of them? It is already more than hard enough for most users to get anything deleted, and there are a large number or articles that should get deleted but remain on Wikipedia because editors can't bring themselves to go through the steps to nolinate anything for deletion already. Adding more hoops won't make Wikipedia better. Fram (talk) 07:16, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Two thoughts occur to me: 1) I had not known until today that there are two separate processes for deletion: AfD, and PROD. (I hadn't know until two days ago that anyone could initiate an AfD.) And 2) personally, I tend to disregard anonymous posters who can't be bothered to register, unless their contributions are obviously worthwhile. But for deletions, by either process, I suggest that registration be required. Of course this still leaves the problem of puppets. Milkunderwood (talk) 07:26, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Well, a third thought: as noted in the section immediately preceding this one, "I can't get the damn thing to work, either :-(", I'm with Fram on the difficulty of using AfD - I'm not entirely a novice here at Wikipedia, but am by no means a very confident editor, and I found this procedure to be horrendously complex and confusing. I'm sure it could be simplified a great deal. But as to initiating a deletion request, by whatever procedure, it shouldn't be that difficult to require a minimum number of posts made by a registered user; and registration with no minimum, for voting. Milkunderwood (talk) 08:16, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

A couple of observations. First, you do not vote at AfDs. All deletion discussions are resolved on the basis of policy. If you simply vote keep or delete at an AfD, it will not count. You must have a policy rationale, and you must explain why you believe it applies in that particular case. Simply parroting another contributor will be counted as a single !vote. Second, users with very few edits are generally discounted (not ignored) when it comes to AfD discussions, because of the dangers of single use accounts and their general lack of experience when it comes to understanding WP policies on deletion. A !vote by an account created since the AfD was posted will almost certainly be ignored as a sock/meat puppet. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 21:04, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Since you're obviously grinding an axe here, surely you must have countless examples of this happening? I don't mean one or two, here or there; I mean a significant percentage of deleted articles. Go on, show us. → ROUX ₪ 09:51, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Please refer to examples below in this discussion, and if you check back, please respond to them. Thank you. Northamerica1000 (talk) 21:25, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Comment from Northamerica1000 (talk) 12:33, 22 September 2011 (UTC)—

To reiterate, per my above treatise, one idea is to include a requirement prior to article nomination for deletion in which the nominator has to state, or simply check-box on a template, that they've performed the required minimum search in Google Books and in the Google News Archive required by WP:BEFORE, and in Google Scholar for academic subjects, as suggested in WP:BEFORE. This would be a simple addition to the AfD nomination process that would add significant integrity to the process, and would also encourage users to follow the proper procedures. Northamerica1000 (talk) 12:33, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Undeletion is an incredibly lightweight process for pages where there has not been established a solid reason for deletion (i.e. a consensus based on debate). I've never understood why rescue types devote so much energy (and waste a collossal amount of that of other editors) on trying to prevent Wikipedia's most marginal content from being deleted when all it takes is one trip to WP:REFUND for any editor who genuinely thinks an article can be brought up to standard to resurrect it. Furthermore, like many of these rhetorical arguments regarding how deletion-heavy Wikipedia supposedly is it ignores the actual state of the project: it is plainly obvious that Wikipedia has an extremely active community of hardcore inclusionists watching over AfD closely to attempt to block any deletion nominations perceived as being invalid, and so the "checks and balances" are already in place. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 12:35, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment from Northamerica1000 (talk) 12:49, 22 September 2011 (UTC) regarding the comment directly above this message by user Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward):
  

Unfortunately, once an article is deleted, it is no longer available to any users except for administrators. All other users receive a message such as this, based upon a Wikipedia search for "123123"— "You may create the page "123123", but consider checking the search results below to see whether the topic is already covered." Users searching for a deleted article, unless they have administrative privileges, can't view it, and therefore, won't know about it's existence, unless perhaps they search through numerous AfD archives, which is unlikely. Northamerica1000 (talk) 12:49, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

If you click on the redlink, you get taken here, which helpfully has the deletion log in a pink box near the top of the page. Cheers. lifebaka++ 12:51, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks for providing details about the deletion log for my "123123" search example, which provides more details regarding this matter. This also further exemplifies my point. Unfortunately, the deleted data remains unviewable (as a red link) for any users except administrators, and then a user has to ask an administrator to provide more information about deleted data. Despite all of this, users won't be able to access the data to ascertain the use of WP:REFUND. Northamerica1000 (talk) 13:11, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• I think that user:Northamerica1000 is making an important point here, that deletion not only takes the material out of mainspace, it also leaves only the administrators knowing what is in the article.  This is appropriate when the material is offensive or libelous, but we have other articles such as Radio Sandwell and Kippax Uniting Church that are not offensive in any way, and simply need a small amount of additional sourcing.  There is no purpose to be had from hiding the articles from ordinary editors.  What we need is a second form of deletion, a form that takes the material out of mainspace and out of the Google search engine, but still allows somehow reading the edit history.  This is a big enough issue that it probably needs a separate discussion at the Village pump.  Unscintillating (talk) 19:27, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

• It's called WP:REFUND - articles can be moved into userspace to be improved with the history intact. --MASEM (t) 19:56, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

• No, somehow you aren't seeing the issue, articles that have been deleted can only be seen by administrators.  For example, I mentioned Radio Sandwell and Kippax Uniting Church.  Do you think that you would like to improve those articles?  No, you can't see them, and you've got other things to do than get them userfied to see what I am talking about.  And the outcome of REFUND already exists at AfD, it is a !vote to Userfy.  What I am talking about is adding a new category for the outcome of AfD decisions, something like "Soft delete" or "Archive delete".  Unscintillating (talk) 20:31, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

• Hmm.... This might be of interest to you: a draft/"workspace" namespace, not indexed by search engines, where newbie articles could reside without getting deleted. Note especially: Articles may be unpublished from the Main namespace. In this event, the article will be moved back to the Workspace. Is this something like what you have in mind with "archive delete"? --Maryana (WMF) (talk) 19:27, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

• Isn't the point though that the contents of articles that have been deleted should be available to future Wikipedians? Ottawahitech (talk) 14:05, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Making WP:BEFORE have any type of weight (a requirement before AFD nom.) should really be considered an unachievable WP:PEREN; it is way too easy to game, and way too bureaucratic. We must assume nominators are making the nominations in good faith with BEFORE in mind. Instead, AFD nominations should be seen as a behavior, and if one regularly puts articles to AFD that are readily, perhaps speedily kept, and which performing BEFORE would have not required the AFD nom, that's something to task the user at at WP:RFC/U or other behavioral problems.

As for articles where they are nominated and no one else responds to them, there's not much we can do about that - it either means they aren't on anyone's watchlist or those that have it there ignored the matter. Fortunately REFUND is very easy and provides the checks and balances on the matter. --MASEM (t) 12:42, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree as it's difficult to "prove" that the nominator did not follow WP:BEFORE. I have seen AFDs where a "keep" !voter has said something like "The nominator didn't follow WP:BEFORE or he would have found a zillion google news hits" when in fact he did and wasn't impressed with anything he saw there. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 13:28, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Exactly. Or take the case where the topic being deleted overlaps with several other, likely more notable topics of similar name, and it is very difficult to tune the right set of search terms to find it if you are not 100% familiar with the topic. You can still make the BEFORE good faith effort, but still be critized "well, duh, you should have tried +x, -y, -z in your search, 100s of hits that way!". --MASEM (t) 13:42, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Also to add: most good faith nominators, if their ghits fail but later shown the right way to get plenty of hits, will usually adjust their stance; they may disagree the hits are appropriate for notability, for example, or in some cases outright withdrawn the nomination. Those nominators that do drive-by noms without checking BEFORE on a regular basis are also the types that refute any sourced discovered during the nom or never respond during the process, and that again is all behavior, not process. --MASEM (t) 13:44, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, drive by nomming and !voting is a problem. IMHO anybody who nominates an article for deletion or !votes in an AFD should be willing to participate in the discussion. If you don't have the time then perhaps you are nominating too many articles for deletion. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 13:50, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• If we're going to talk about checks and balances in AFD, how about we address Northamerica1000's !voting habbits. Such as using the exact same copypaste rationale, using a WP:NOT rationale as inclusion policy, or simply looking at the AFD vote counter where his opinion only matches the close 57% of the time. When there are only two options (Support/Delete), 50% accuracy is easy to achieve. (Note, set it to ignore the last 2 weeks because too many AFDs weren't closed yet.) As an AFD closer, I give less weight to NA1K's rationale when I see this repetitive behavior. I rather find it disruptive to an AFD. Google hits don't confer notability and neither does WP:NOT.--v/r - TP 14:32, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• To be fair, a lowish percentage of opinons matching the close isn't necessarily a problem. Some highly respected admins like DGG (65.6%) and Karanacs (62.2%) have only marginally higher ratios, and there are AfD regulars like TenPoundHammer and FeydHuxtable below 60%. A high percentage can be easily "achieved" by only !voting in clear-cut cases where the outcome is pretty much decided without adding anything to the discussion. It's probably better if this isn't used as a metric for worthiness of contributions, or we could end up with a scenario in which competent editors avoid commenting in contentious cases to avoid the risk of damaging their record. Alzarian16 (talk) 19:12, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment: I would prefer that the apparent abbreviation of my user name used above, "NA1K", be discontinued, as it requires people to decode my user name within comments, which may delay this discussion. It is more functional to use my actual user name, "Northamerica1000", in which people don't have to decode, or figure out the abbreviation. Thank you for your consideration. Northamerica1000 (talk) 21:50, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) it seems to me that drive-by nominations are less of a problem than drive-by !voting. the afds i've seen where the nomination is really off the wall have usually failed quickly without a lot of time wasted, since the sources are easy to find. what worries me more is the borderline cases, where there are two or three potentially reliable but not obviously so sources hidden in a mass of junk, and the quality of those sources actually needs to be discussed by the community in order to figure out what to do. it *does* feel like a waste of time to have two or three serious discussants, surrounded by a bunch of "delete not notable" or "keep 23433 ghits", and then feel as if the closing admin spent more time counting than reading. of course, i have no examples right now, and i don't want to criticize specific closures anyway. we say that !votes with reasons will be taken more seriously. perhaps admins could be encouraged to strike !votes that didn't give some detailed reasoning in their opinion before closing afds, so that the community could see that they really weren't taking those drive-by votes into account? that's just an off-of-the-top idea, i've put very little thought into it, it may be unworkable, etc. drive-by !voting is an important aspect of afds to discuss, though. — alf.laylah.wa.laylah (talk) 14:45, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment from Northamerica1000 (talk) 16:07, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
  

The addition of a very simple check-box type of confirmation within the procedures of nominating an article for deletion, in which users verify that they've performed the required source searching per WP:BEFORE guidelines prior to nominating an article for deletion would be very functional, and is a reasonable idea (and is also my idea). Another idea is to require, or at least encourage users to state that the basic source searching has been undertaken in the edit summary when the article is nominated for deletion. Oftentimes, people continue to nominate articles for deletion that are actually topically notable, per the availability of reliable sources. For whatever reasons, people continue to refer articles to AfD under very basic rationales, which are often countered through simple internet searches for reliable sources. Sometimes people refer to entire pages of guidelines as a rationale for article deletion, which fails to qualify specific reasons for notability or lack thereof, and equates to referring to an entire list of multiple, specific rationales as a singular, generic rationale for article deletion. This equates to stating that an article should be deleted because of any reason on a guideline page, without actually stating any of the criterion on the guideline page to qualify the statement, which is illogical. In these types of cases, even when assuming the nominator is referring to the basic criterion section of a guideline page, oftentimes no specific part of the basic criterion are mentioned, which again is inspecific and ambiguous. Northamerica1000 (talk) 16:07, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Articles can't be deleted without a consensus. There's your check. Articles can be created without a consensus. If anything, there's an imbalance towards creation. But it should continue to be this way. Editors create a slew of articles, they're scrutinized by other editors, and we filter out the ones where there's a consensus that there's no potential. The system works. If we're going to prevent editors from starting an AFD without doing a google search, then we need to prevent articles from being created without more sources. Dzlife (talk) 16:11, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Pardon my ignorance, but shouldn't the editor who wrote the article be responsible for finding those sources? Northamerica1000, are you suggesting someone can write an unsourced article and then demand that those who want to delete said unsourced article are responsible for finding sources for it? That's just crazy. If someone is suggesting AfD for an article without sources, and the editor who wrote it isn't prepared to back up the information with valid sources and then moans when it gets deleted, there's something wrong with the system! In the case that the article was written years ago by someone who is no longer active on Wikipedia, then maybe some sort of "rescue" should be performed first - but where an editor is active? That editor should be responsible for the sourcing. MeegsC | Talk 16:26, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Millions of articles were created before the notability guideline even existed, and even after it, people just ignored these suggested guidelines when they were mentioned in AFDs for quite some time, including closing administrators. Those times have changed. We do not go through and nominate millions of articles for deletion based on lack of sources. Often times a simple search on Google news will show something got coverage. Dream Focus 16:33, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Huh. It says there are only 253,307 articles that link to the unreferenced template. [1] It also says the tool isn't working properly now, so the results might not be accurate. Anyway, hordes of things go to AFD which have references, just people arguing if its notable enough. Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Tyler_Shields has a long time editor of Wikipedia commenting that the guy does meet the General Notability Guidelines but still says the article should be deleted, because he hates celebrities. Dream Focus 16:39, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

When you take to the policy pages to rescue an article so non-notable that even DGG says we should delete it, it's time to have a pause for self-reflection. Dzlife (talk) 18:17, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• In response to user thumperward/Chris Cunningham, I'd like to point out that deletion review gives random results. [2] List of Native American women was overturned to keep, while List of African American women was endorsed as staying deleted [3] despite there no valid rational for deleting it. The same articles, it just random guess who shows up and argues, and the opinions of whoever is closing the discussion. Dream Focus 16:45, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• In response to user thumperward/Chris Cunningham's comment "it is plainly obvious that Wikipedia has an extremely active community of hardcore inclusionists watching over AfD closely to attempt to block any deletion nominations perceived as being invalid", I'd like to point that since it is so easily for anyone to nominate things for deletion, there are always far more nominations than anyone can get through. I've seen certain people nominating scores of articles almost every day it seems, and if enough people show up to actually look for sources and comment, then its likely to be kept, and if not, it gets deleted. Its more of a game of chance than an actual functioning system. And if an article is kept, the same exact nominator can renominate it for deletion later on, multiple times even, until they get the result they want. Dream Focus 16:48, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Why does "[blocking] any deletion nominations perceived as being invalid" make you a "hardcore inclusionist"? Isn't this what you're supposed to do?!? And, as numerous posters are arguing that this is the only check necessary, the "hardcore inclusionist" slur implies that some are hostile even to this check! Also, a potentially destructive process that can very easily be set in motion, yet takes substantial energy to halt would not be approved by any engineer in existence. (Or was Chemical Ali an engineer?) Heavenlyblue (talk) 22:32, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

• i agree with Dream Focus here about the chancy aspects of afd. i wonder if a policy of no more than one nomination per year per article might be useful, or some such time restriction (i'm sorry if this has been considered and rejected before, i haven't looked incredibly carefully). this would make the discussions feel as if they had a chance of having some lasting effect. — alf.laylah.wa.laylah (talk) 16:54, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose a 1-year restriction on AFDs. It would create a method to game the system. I create an article, get a buddy of mine to nominate it for AFD, and a few other buddies to support keeping it. AFD closes as keep, my article stays on Wikipedia for 1 year.--v/r - TP 17:56, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

comment— good lord, of course you're right. it didn't even occur to me. — alf.laylah.wa.laylah (talk) 18:00, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Since you obviously have no examples of this alleged problem occurring, I fail to see why we should entertain this nonsense. I suggest this ridiculous axe-grinding be hatted. → ROUX ₪ 18:54, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Per the request for examples, please refer to my comment below in this discussion, examples of articles that may have been hastily nominated for deletion for specific examples. Thank you.Northamerica1000 (talk) 05:58, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Per Roux, I can find no cited examples where an article with appropriate sources was nominated for deletion via AFD, and was then summarily deleted without significant support from later comments. If the OP can provide examples of the problem, then we may have something to work on. It appears so far as though this is a hypothetical problem, and I don't see where we need solutions to problems that do not exist. --Jayron32 19:02, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Per the request for examples, please refer to my comment below in this discussion, examples of articles that may have been hastily nominated for deletion for specific examples. Thank you.Northamerica1000 (talk) 05:58, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• I am sure that examples of such deletions can be found, but showing whether its a significant problem would be more difficult. Articles can be deleted with just a nomination and one or two delete votes, though often a relisting will occur in such inactive discussions. Typical deletions of articles on notable subjects revolve around stubs or badly written/sourced articles, that is, articles that could be improved but have not been. Some editors have no problem with such deletions, though at some point it clearly impacts on the "improve as you go" nature of the project. In my experience, if I lightly chastise an editor for a bad nomination, they may well be more careful the next time. I don't think a checkbox proposal would be especially useful, as WP:BEFORE should be adhered to in every case.--Milowent • ^talkblp-r 19:34, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• It is quite telling that while we have this discussion here the most active AFDs today are those where all commentators execpt the nominator think they should be kept. Enough checks and balances. Would have missed that if it had not been for NA1K. Agathoclea (talk) 19:44, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment– Regarding remarks from user:Agathoclea directly above this message: I see no correlation with current events in a daily AfD log being associated with the ideas I have posited here. A further explanation regarding your stance would be helpful. Thank you. Northamerica1000 (talk) 06:15, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Obviously wrong nomminations garner far more interest than obviously correct ones. Proof that the system works. Agathoclea (talk) 06:35, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment: I would prefer that the apparent abbreviation of my user name used above, "NA1K", be discontinued, as it requires people to decode my user name within comments, which may delay this discussion. It is more functional to use my actual user name, "Northamerica1000", in which people don't have to decode, or figure out the abbreviation. Thank you for your consideration. Northamerica1000 (talk) 21:52, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Agree with Roux. This is just a lot of bawwwing. Regarding WP:BEFORE, there have been two recent discussions aimed at clarifying what its status actually is. The consensus reached was that it is not a policy, not a guideline, not obligatory, and so full of irrelevant checkbox-type hurdles that it has required an extensive rewrite. Reyk _YO! 20:06, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment– Regarding remarks from user:Reyk directly above this message: Could you please provide links to the two recent discussion you mention, so they can be considered within this discussion? There is significant precedent in Wikipedia policies to avoid the hasty nomination of articles for deletion about topics that are actually notable. Please refer to Wikipedia:Deletion policy, section WP:ATD for some examples. Thank you. Northamerica1000 (talk) 06:10, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Certainly. The discussion regarding its status can be found here. The discussion regarding the rewrite is here; there are also some related threads towards the end of the last archive archive #62 of this talk page. Reyk _YO! 22:28, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• I agree that this is all meaningless unless we get hard evidence that there is a problem. I'm sure there are AfDs where wrong or inconsistent conclusions are reached but that's always going to happen as long as our inclusion guidelines depend in any way on editorial judgement. To actually show that AfD is frequently reaching the wrong conclusion someone would have to take a random sample of AfDs and scrutinise them carefully to check if the right outcome is reached. If a lot of these discussions resulted in articles being wrongly deleted then we can say that there is a problem and discuss solutions. Hut 8.5 21:05, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

• Per the request for examples, please refer to my comment below in this discussion, examples of articles that may have been hastily nominated for deletion for specific examples. Thank you.Northamerica1000 (talk) 05:58, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• You've given 5 examples of articles which were kept, one which was closed as no consensus and two that were deleted. The ones that were closed as keep or no consensus don't support your position that the process is flawed (because the attempts at deletion were not successful), and you're not alleging that the two that were deleted should have been kept. These examples (which are largely drawn from your personal experience and thus can't be said to be representative of all AfD debates) don't support your position that the process is flawed and needs adjustment. Hut 8.5 20:26, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• The articles that were kept were nominated hastily, and in error, which is the initial problem. It seems prudent to at least consider ways to improve notable topics from being nominated for deletion, because people may base their decisions to delete upon personal reasons, biases and other subjective rationales. Each kept article in the examples cited shouldn't have been nominated for deletion in the first place, because the topic was actually notable, per Wikipedia notability guidelines. It seems functional to address these issues on a macro level, rather than briefly criticize the examples that I took the time to post here as insufficient, and therefore dismissive of the entire discussion. The AfD process is very subjective per each individual article. Research takes time. Could you (User:Hut) consider taking a few minutes of your time to provide examples to the contrary? Doing so would significantly contribute to the overall premise of this discussion. Thank you for your consideration. Northamerica1000 (talk) 22:38, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Your argument is that the existing checks and balances in the AfD process are not sufficient to prevent notable articles being deleted. You've given examples of poor nominations that were shot down in flames. This is evidence that the existing checks and balances are adequate because they succeeded in preventing notable topics from being deleted. You are the one who wants to change the system and so the onus is on you to provide evidence that your proposed change is necessary. I'm certainly not going to do your research for you. Hut 8.5 10:44, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

• Research you declined doing would have been for this discussion, not for my benefit. This isn't my "cause", it's just a discussion regarding a topic to improve Wikipedia overall. I'm not interested, per your assumptive statement above, in 'changing the system', just discussing ways to improve it. As of today, many users have provided input, and some additional examples, which is appreciated. Northamerica1000 (talk) 15:24, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

• I'm another person who doesn't see a problem. Errors on Wikipedia are usually corrected through discussion. If someone nominates an article for deletion in error, you'll have at least three or four editors looking at it who will uncover the error. Otherwise, the AFD is relisted until enough editors look at it. It's literally impossible for one editor to delete an article, especially if they made an error. Shooterwalker (talk) 22:10, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

To see the problem I suggest that you need to stay focused on a Wikipedia resource: editorial time.  An editor at WP:Articles for deletion/Jonathan Higgins (2nd nomination) openly testifies that those wanting an article deleted have no responsibility to do any work, it is their job to point their finger at an article, at which point it is up to the rest of the community to justify having that article remain in public view.  IMO, this is a work imbalance that creates a bias, a bias to hide good material. 

[insert begins here]

That's not what it says at all. The onus is on article editors to properly source the articles. Which is policy. People saying delete are required to provide a policy rationale for their delete opinion. Keepers are required to show otherwise. If the article's editors did not do their job in citing reliable sources, it is not the responsibility of deletionists to go out and troll the entire internet to see if there might be something out there. Keepers may want to do that, but the question is never about what is out there, it is always about what is in here. What sources are cited? Does the article, as it currently exists, meet notability guidelines? That's the question; not "could the article be made compliant?, but "does it meet WP policy right now?". VanIsaac_WS^contribs 02:36, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

[insert ends here]

For example, at WP:Articles for deletion/Kippax Uniting Church, I invested 24 man-hours before posting a Keep vote.  If you look at the AfD, you will see the evidence that the first three delete votes did not read the references.  The final delete vote depended on two of the original three delete votes, so we have evidence that this article was deleted without any of the delete positions reading the references.  My estimate for the total time spent in preparing the four deletion !votes is one hour.  Unscintillating (talk) 00:52, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Let's be perfectly clear. You did not invest 24 man-hours in order to request a keep. You invested 24 man-hours to justify your keep. A big problem in these AfDs is that many "keepers" throw large chunks of spaghetti at the wall to see if anything sticks, and it sometimes makes the specifics of earlier deletes irrelevant, even if their substance still remains. For example, I go to an AfD for an ice cream store and see two references, each of which only mentions the subject in passing (ala, so and so got a grant from the local government to install an experimental solar-powered freezer), I would say delete on the basis that there is no significant coverage. Then along comes a desperate keeper who can see that it's not going his way - his favorite ice cream shop is going to lose its Wikipedia page! So he adds a dozen references from school bulletins, public access news shows, and local radio interviews. Well, now there is significant coverage, except that none of those sources are suitable for establishing notability. So my previous comment, although it is now technically not true, is still valid - the subject still does not meet notability guidelines, only its now because the sources themselves are not sufficient, rather than their coverage of the subject isn't sufficient. You see the problem here, don't you? Moving the goalposts doesn't help these discussions, and neither does putting up barriers to starting deletion discussions. I've still yet to hear of a single incident where a lone gunman somehow nominates an article for deletion, it gets deleted without anyone chiming in, and then others aren't able to get a simple REFUND when they've found resources that correct the problem with the original article. It just plain doesn't happen. Remember that people disagreeing with you doesn't mean the system is broken - it means the system is balanced. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 02:10, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Per the statement above by user:Vanisaac, your summary appears to be that the AfD nomination process and the AfD discussion process are at their optimal state, and merit no further consideration for improvement. The arguments above seem to be based upon an "us versus them" rationale of "keepers" versus those who nominate articles for deletion. Perhaps deletion discussions should occur before articles are nominated for deletion, such as in discussion pages for articles. The macro notions I have presented are to consider possible means to preserve articles based upon topics that are notable, per reliable sources, to therefore improve the Wikipedia project. It seems unlikely that most Wikipedia contributors are interested in working to contact administrators (per WP:REFUND) about deleted articles that aren't accessible to them, because only administrators can access deleted articles. All other users just see red links. However, perhaps one in 100,000 users might take the time to do so, and after considerable effort, perhaps manage to reestablish an article in this manner. It's probable that this won't occur very often whatsoever. It's notably apparent, in part from the examples I have provided for articles that were retained after unnecessarily being referred to AfD, that articles continue to be nominated for deletion based upon whatever reasons other than simple searches for reliable sources, which again, takes more time to accomplish than simply basing a nomination upon a generic rationale such as, "Doesn't meet GNG". I'm surprised that at this point nobody else has provided examples of articles that were unnecessarily referred to AfD which only actually needed improvements. I found some. A significant notion is to consider better checks and balances to prevent the wasting of user time debating about articles that don't actually deserve to be deleted, nor nominated for deletion in the first place. Northamerica1000 (talk) 23:42, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• One solution I think is that creating an AfD discussion should be a privilege, not a right, like the rollbacker bit.  This would in turn allow the admins to impose some feedback on the process, such as if a nominator is wasting the community's time with inadequately researched nominations, any admin could take away the editor's AfD privilege.  Unscintillating (talk) 00:52, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

This is already a possibility - haven't we banned at least one user from AfD nominations before? - if a user demonstrates that they are wasting community time. The trouble with your analogy is that rollback is granted, where the ability to nominate articles for AfD is a default. lifebaka++ 01:01, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes. Users do get banned from nominating AfDs because of abuse. It's not a bit that's set, it is a community sanction that can be backed with blocks for noncompliance, just like interaction bans. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 02:10, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

There are several inclusionists I think should be banned from AFDs including NA1K himself. Having a userright might not be such a bad idea. (last sentence is sarcasm).--v/r - TP 03:06, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment: I would prefer that the apparent abbreviation of my user name used above, "NA1K", be discontinued, as it requires people to decode my user name within comments, which may delay this discussion. It is more functional to use my actual user name, "Northamerica1000", in which people don't have to decode, or figure out the abbreviation. Thank you for your consideration. Northamerica1000 (talk) 22:01, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• About the "checkbox/template" thing – what prevents me from disregarding WP:BEFORE when nominating an article for deletion but still blindly check the box? It's like checking the "I agree to the terms and conditions" checkbox whenever you install software when almost nobody reads said terms and conditions. While I support following WP:BEFORE before proposing deletion, something like this is too easy to game and simply lie about. –MuZemike 01:03, 23 September 2011 (UTC)
• hi after reading this i'd like to make two points:
• (1) deleting an article can undo the work of a lot of people, while creating an article only creates the work of one person, so saying that deleting and creating are equally easy doesn't make sense.
• (2) i saw some articles got deleted with PROD which has no checks and balances at all for low visibility but notable articles. i think this is worse than the other kind of discussions which i guess can still happen with only a few people noticing, not enough to really get an idea of whether the article can be fixed or should be deleted. Bouket (talk) 05:07, 23 September 2011 (UTC)
• I've participated in about a thousand AfD debates and the statistics I've posted on my user page show that I'm neither a deletionist nor an inclusionist. I do recommend that nominators follow WP:BEFORE and describe their efforts to find sources establishing notability. Three word deletion rationales bug me a bit. I think that everyone who participates - article creators, nominators and those who comment in the debates - should add good sources to articles if they can be found, time permitting. We're all volunteers here. I scan through far more AfDs than I comment on, and if I am on the fence, or find the topic entirely uninteresting and/or predictable, I look for another article where I can make a useful contribution to the process. I am proud to have expanded and referenced quite a few article I've stumbled across at AfD, and list those on my user page. All in all, I think the system functions pretty well, and I think that the right decision is made probably 95% or more of the time. I've only asked for one or two articles to be userfied, and that was an easy process. So, I see no evidence at this time that the process is deeply flawed. It would run better if a few more editors pitched in with open minds and a willingness to do research and to study our policies and guidelines. It's all about making this a better and more useful encyclopedia. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 05:39, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment from Northamerica1000 (talk) 05:49, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Here are some examples of articles that may have been hastily nominated for deletion, and possibly done so without the required source searching per WP:BEFORE. Please note that, importantly, these examples are in no manner, way, shape or form meant to be perceived as judgments against the respective editors who nominated the article or editors that contributed to the AfD discussion. I am providing these examples because people above requested specific examples. I was initially hesitant to provide examples, because my intention here is to enourage a discussion about ideas to improve the nomination for article deletion process, in the interest of conserving topics that are actually notable. Again, it is NOT my intention here to judge other users' behaviors, nor to promote any type of finger-pointing or blaming.

1. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kaldor's Growth Model– (Full disclosure: I contributed to this article, but not to the AfD for this article.) It seems possible that the minimum required search for reliable sources may not have occurred to qualify this article's nomination for deletion. Note the basis of the nomination, in which the nominator stated, in part “no indications of notability or separate importance,” when stated topic notability does actually exist. It appears that the provision of several additional sources from another user likely influenced to overall decision to “keep” the article.

2. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Institute for Gulf Affairs– (Full disclosure: I contributed to this AfD and also contributed to the article.) The verbatim justification for deletion was, “I can't find sources which discuss this institute in any great depth, which would give it notability for an encyclopaedia.” While the nominator did appropriately mention looking for sources, it appears that reliable sources were readily available per the minimum required source searching per WP:BEFORE policy, as indicated in the discussion below the nomination.

3. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Steve Mantis– (Full disclosure: I contributed to this AfD and also contributed to the article.) The rationale provided for deletion was (verbatim), “Clearly does not meet the notability guideline as per WP:POLITICIAN.” However, no specific points from WP:POLITICIAN were provided to qualify the statement. This is an example of referring to an entire list of specific guidelines as a singular, generic rationale for article deletion. Per the AfD discussion, other users pointed out that the topic passed notability guidelines per WP:GNG, which states, “If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject, it is presumed to satisfy the inclusion criteria for a stand-alone article or stand-alone list.” In this manner, the topic was demonstrated to pass the most basic of notability guidelines, a one-line sentence with subpoints that explain the intention of the statement. In my opinion, the article also already had several reliable sources already in it that satisfied the guidelines of WP:BIO, section WP:BASIC, specifically (per WP:BASIC), “ “A person is presumed to be notable if he or she has been the subject of multiple published secondary sources which are reliable, intellectually independent of each other, and independent of the subject.” If the depth of coverage in any given source is not substantial, then multiple independent sources may be combined to demonstrate notability; trivial coverage of a subject by secondary sources may not be sufficient to establish notability.”

4. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tiffany Page– (Full disclosure: I contributed to this AfD.) The rationale provided for deletion was (verbatim), “This is a non-notable artist and the page information is incorrect and I have found no sources to back up a lot of the information, such as if the artist is really dead or if her singles or albums really charted in all those different countries.” It seems possible that the minimum required search for reliable sources may not have occurred to qualify this article's nomination for deletion. In this example, it seems that the nominator was searching for sources to verify information already present within the article, rather than source searching to qualify topic notability. In this example, the availability of reliable sources established topic notability.

5. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/OxiClean (3rd nomination)– (Full disclosure: I contributed to this AfD and also contributed to the article by adding a {{Rescue}} tag to it.) The rationale provided for deletion was (verbatim), “Kept last time due to sources, but on further inspection they're press releases. Delete or merge to that big shouty guy.” It seems possible that the minimum required search for reliable sources may not have occurred to qualify this article's nomination for deletion. In this example, it seems that the nominator was basing the rationale to delete the article based upon sources within the article, rather than upon the minimum required source searching per WP:BEFORE policy for available reliable sources.

Importantly, to reiterate, please note that these examples are in no manner, way, shape or form meant to be perceived as judgments against the respective editors who nominated the article or editors that contributed to the AfD discussion. I am providing these examples because people above requested specific examples. Please post comments regarding these examples below this message, rather than in between each example on the edit page. Thank you. Northamerica1000 (talk) 05:49, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Wait a second here... Let me get this striaght. Your examples for articles being improperly deleted is five articles that weren't deleted? Your evidence of the process needing to be overhauled is five examples where the process worked perfectly? I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 06:01, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment– In these cases, if nobody had come along to correct the hasty, faulty and unqualified nominations, the articles may have been deleted. Please note that it takes much more time to do research to disqualify hasty nominations for deletion than it does to post hasty nominations. These examples are absolutely relevant to my ideas presented at the top of this discussion. Northamerica1000 (talk) 06:36, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

A) If nobody comes along, there is no consensus, and it is kept, so saying that if nobody came along it may have been deleted is just plain wrong. B)Your assertion that these were "hasty, faulty, or unqualified" is not supported by the discussions. C)There is no evidence whatsoever in any of these discussion that those who !vote "keep" had a greater onus than the nom. D)Some of these articles were demonstrably improved because of their AfD discussion, and the attention that was brought to bear concerning references.

• Comment– The above comment from what appears to be from user:Agathoclea is taken out of context. I stated, "if nobody had come along to correct the hasty, faulty and unqualified nominations...". Above this comment, I was discussing the examples I provided, not the concept of nobody coming along whatsoever and how a "no consensus" decision is reached. If other's had come along and provided, for example, simple "as per nom" votes, it is possible that these articles may have been deleted. Either way, my remarks were not about nobody contributing to the AfD. This seems quite apparent to me, anyway. Regarding the comment above, "Your assertion that these were "hasty, faulty, or unqualified" is not supported by the discussions."— How so? They are clearly stated and my rationales are also clearly stated. Rather than a general statement that refers to all five rationales as "unsupported", could you please explain your rationale further with examples, and/or further opinions? This would help clarify your stance about each, separate example. Regarding article improvements that occur during their AfD discussion: This further exemplifies how the articles were nominated hastily, while not actually deserving to be nominated for deletion because the topics were in fact, notable per the availability of reliable sources. Northamerica1000 (talk) 11:25, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

AfDs are not a battle between those who want to delete and those that want to keep, it is a collaboration in which you try to come to a consensus on what is best for the project. Those who disagree with you are not enemies, but I get the feeling of animus in your repeated assertions that those who !vote "keep" have to do more work somehow. For your information, it is nearly impossible to make a coherent "delete" (read, one that the closing admin will pay attention to) without checking over all of the references in the article. Wikipedia is not a democracy, and all deletion discussions are decided based on policy. If you can't produce a convincing policy argument about the current article that backs up your !vote, it will not be considered, whether you !vote "delete" or "keep". Understanding policy and applying it is just as hard for deletionists as it is for inclusionists. If you decide that a given article is worth your time, then put in that time. Otherwise, feel free to not participate in a given discussion. I troll ANI, and check out several AfDs per week, but I just plain don't care enough about most of them to spend the time to add to the discussion. Lastly, absolutely none of what you have posted takes into account that you can almost always get any deleted article userfied.

As far as #2 is concerned - the fact was mentioned that a banned user created the article and as such it could have been speedily deleted. Commendable for the nomminator to have second thoughts on that and send it to AFD instead. In probably all those cases the article even benefited from the nomination by being improved. On the other hand there are cases where some keep on nominating articles which clearly should be kept and then fighting tooth and claw against anyone stating so. I was thinking about an awards system: Bronze AFD Lemmon for 3 or more nomminations in a given day which are kept; Silver AFD Lemmon for the most kept nomminations in a month and the Gold AFD Lemmon for the year. Both ends of the spectrum are equally bad - those that want to destroy everything and those that want to horde any old rubbish. Agathoclea (talk) 06:10, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

These five examples seem to provide evidence that the process works well, not that it is fundamentally flawed. Disclosure - I participated in one of the above debates. I believe that the process works well the vast majority of the time, and we have deletion review and userfication available for the occasional case where a mistake is made. More neutral, thoughtful editors willing to chime in would reduce the already low error rate even further, in my view. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 06:12, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment– The process works well only when editors are willing to spend their time to disqualify erroneous nominations. This is concerning, because again, it takes much more time and effort to disqualify faulty nominations than it does to post them. Hence, there is room for improvement to increase checks and balances in the nomination process to prevent stated erroneous nominations from occurring in the first place. The five examples I presented above are quite relevant examples of stated hasty nominations that needed correction. If nobody came along to correct the problem, the articles may have been deleted from another person simply voting, for example, "as per nom." A significant problem is the ease in which stated hasty nominations occur, versus the time it takes for editors to correct them. Another significant point regards the desire of editors to spend time doing so, spending hours of time to correct stated hasty nominations that take seconds to post. As it exists now, any article can be nominated for deletion in seconds, while researching for the availability of reliable sources takes a considerably greater amount of time. It's very unlikely that a significant amount of editors will want to devote a great deal of their time correcting these types of hasty nominations for deletion, which again, take only seconds to post. Additionally, please refer to two additional examples I provided below about articles that may have been hastily deleted. Northamerica1000 (talk) 07:08, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

And this assumes that there are an inordinate amount of erroneous nominations out there - an assertion that I, for one, disagree with entirely. Almost all deletion discussions I have seen are based on a good, solid, well-reasoned nomination, even those that end up as "keeps". It also assumes that a "keep" comment is somehow more difficult than a "delete" - another assertion that I dispute, not the least in part due to the large number of coherent and well-researched "keep" !votes that many AfDs have. An "as per nom" really only works when the nomination is actually really comprehensive, and remember that admins are human - discussions can get closed before everyone's had a chance to respond. That's why we have deletion reviews. I think you assume that people just randomly nominate and comment on AfDs, and I've seen no evidence whatsoever that that's the case. I can tell you unequivocally that if you take hours to respond to a deletion discussion, you are doing something very wrong, or there was something very wrong with the article. If you don't assume that nominations are made in bad faith, basically your argument dies. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 08:04, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Per the comment above from user:Vanisaac, ..."I think you assume that people just randomly nominate and comment on AfDs, and I've seen no evidence whatsoever that that's the case."— Please refer to this example provided by user:Dream Focus above: ..."[4] List of Native American women was overturned to keep, while List of African American women was endorsed as staying deleted [5] despite there no valid rational for deleting it. The same articles, it just random guess who shows up and argues, and the opinions of whoever is closing the discussion." Thanks. Northamerica1000 (talk) 05:17, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

I speak only for myself but I have been happy to do the homework and comment on hundreds of them. I've learned a lot, developed a better sense of how the encyclopedia works, and managed to improve quite a few articles in the process. I've also seen a lot of total junk get eliminated. Don't forget that. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 07:17, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment from Northamerica1000 (talk) 06:47, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Examples of articles that may have been hastily nominated for deletion, which were then deleted

• 1. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Leo Goldseed. One vote to delete and the article was deleted. Perhaps this AfD could have been relisted to generate further discussion.

• 2. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Wooster (manufacturer). One vote to "Delete per nom" (verbatim) and the article was deleted. Perhaps this AfD could have been relisted a second time to generate further discussion.

It takes time to go through AfD logs to cite examples that I know to exist because they have been seen numerous times. Please be patient. Perhaps others can spend a few minutes doing the same types of searches, to improve this discussion. Thank you for your consideration. Northamerica1000 (talk) 06:48, 23 September 2011 (UTC) Please note that these examples are in no manner, way, shape or form meant to be perceived as judgments against the respective editors who nominated the article or editors that contributed to the AfD discussion. I am providing these examples because people above requested specific examples. Northamerica1000 (talk) 06:51, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Based on a quick review, I see no evidence whatsoever that Leo Goldseed is notable. I find passing mentions of two manufacturers a century or more ago called "Wooster". One made harnesses and perhaps went the way of the once-thriving buggy whip manufacturers. The other made overalls. Neither seems all that notable but I could be wrong.

If you think these topics have the potential to be shown as notable, simply ask an administrator to userfy the articles in your own userspace. Let me know if you do, and I will be happy to spend some serious time trying to track down sources. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 07:12, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

The "Wooster" that was deleted was about a "model airplane manufacturer" now owned by PPC Holland. The latter has more chance of being notable enough for an article than the former, it seems. As for Leo Goldseed, I also can't find any indication of notability. Mind you, there have been mistakes on AfD, both in keeping articles that should have been deleted and vice versa. No amount of checks and balances will prevent this, but the harder it is made to nominate anything for deletion, the more articles will not be nominated that should be deleted. The current system seems to work reasonably well. Fram (talk) 07:24, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

The "as per Nom" was after a relisting, in which nobody else participated, and note that the nominator actually noted a rather significant understanding of exactly what the article subject was. This is what is called an "uncontroversial deletion" and is absolutely within policy. Probably dozens of people took the time to check out this particular AfD, and didn't have anything to add to the discussion, so they simply left.

The single delete example, on the other hand, indicates that both the nom and the second commenter both did a significant amount of outside research to verify that conclusion. Although to be honest, I would have relisted the Leo Goldseed article for another week, just to see if anyone else might have had a music journal stuck in their closet, it doesn't change the fact that these were both destined for the dustbin as soon as someone knowledgable came around and cared enough to nominate them. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 07:35, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Regarding the "addition" you just posted to your original comment: please try to see this from an opposite position, by replacing "delete" by "create" in your text. For many articles, it has taken less time to create them than to research them sufficiently to make a nomination. Article creation is extremely easy compared to nominating anything for deletion at AFD at the moment. That doesn't mean that hasty nominations aren't made, and that some users don't need correcting (assuming they don't self-correct while going through a learning curve). But the truly hasty nominations don't take that much time to correct usually: if it takes hours to find the sources that show that a subject is notable, the original nominator can hardly be blamed for not having found them in the first place. Fram (talk) 07:43, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Currently, only registered users can create articles, while all users can nominate articles for deletion. This somewhat counters your argument that it's very easy to create an article, because for all un-registered contributors, it's impossible. Conversely, it's also much easier and quicker for stated unregistered contributors to nominate articles for deletion, because they don't have to complete steps two and three in "How to list pages for deletion", located at WP:AFDHOWTO. The steps to nominate an article for deletion are actually very easy to perform for registered users too. The following are basic estimates, and aren't meant to be considered as absolutes, because different users have different abilities, internet savvy and internet connection speeds: Copy and paste a template to an article, which takes about 5-7 seconds to do, copy and paste data to the edit summary, another 5-7 seconds, then click on the link to a pre-formatted AfD page and complete the simple steps there, which may take from 30 to 60 seconds, maybe more for less savvy internet users. Per many AfD treatises, the addition of rationale for deletion, if comprised of just brief noun-phrases takes perhaps 10-15 seconds to type. Then a copy/paste to the articles for deletion log page is done and some text is replaced in the copy/paste, another 10-20 seconds. Adding the deletion sorting template, if appropriate, and an edit summary takes perhaps another 10-15 seconds. There are some steps involved here, but they're pretty easy to accomplish, and it seems reasonable that savvy internet users with high-speed connections can accomplish all of this quickly, particularly if they have the steps memorized. Perhaps having a bot perform some of these tasks to automate the process further would be beneficial to the process, which could reduce some of these steps.

Additionally, and importantly, it appears that oftentimes the research to qualify nomination of an article for deletion isn't occurring, as evidenced by the many articles that are kept after AfD discussions. It's apparent that many articles are being hastily nominated, otherwise there would be very few articles that would be retained after AfD discussions are closed— almost all would be deleted if nominators consistently researched for reliable sources. Some people commented that the examples I cited regarding articles that were kept are invalid, when in fact, they are testimonial that article's are being hastily nominated without first source-searching, as per the rationale presented in my treatise at the top of this section. Some arguments in this discussion that the system "works" because the articles were kept are based upon partial analysis, as a hasty generalization, because again, in order for the system to work, people have to devote significant amounts of time to qualify article retention. It is plainly obvious that this system could be significantly improved, in which people don't have to disqualify nominations that are already erroneous, as evidenced by each and every article that is kept. How much time and energy do people realistically want to spend refuting inferior logic and hasty generalizations that are often present in article nominations? Again, every article that is kept is testimonial that this is, unfortunately, how the AfD system is arranged.

Unfortunately, oftentimes people voting to delete, as I've seen repeatedly in AfD logs, just state their rationale in brief noun-phrases, which doesn't require much analysis to perform. Sometimes people voting to delete qualify the deletion by citing entire pages of guidelines, with statements such as "non-notable topic," "no references in the article," and "doesn't meet _____" guidelines while not pointing out specific parts of the guidelines as a qualification for deletion, which equates to referring to an entire page of guidelines as a singular, generic rationale for article deletion (like holding up an entire rule book and stating that the article should be deleted because of any data in the book). Articles that are retained are retained because they were nominated for deletion in error. It would be best to correct errors in this process, if possible. In order for the system to be truly functional, most articles nominated for deletion would be deleted. Again, the manner in which many articles are retained after AfD discussions is testimonial to the matter of the system not working very functionally. Anyone who has spent perhaps ten to fifteen minutes browsing AfD logs will see examples such as this, they occur very often. As it is now, too often the burden is upon people spending their time researching and disqualifying nominations that were in error, as evidenced in every article that is kept. Conversely, there's much less little burden in the process of nominating an article for deletion, particularly when article deletion is based upon simple noun-phrases.

It's my general estimate that it's going to take more than 1-2 minutes for users to perform the minimum source searching alone that's required to refute an AfD nomination per topic notability guidelines. Thereafter, it takes additional time to formulate rationales while typing them onto the AfD discussion page, do all of the necessary copying and pasting involved to provide external links to sources, etc. Furthermore, research involves the use of cognition and thought formulation, and hence, energy. It takes much less cognitive energy to do copy/pastes and fill in templates. While some AfD nominations are thorough, more often they are rather brief, and often based upon very simple wording, such as "Doesn't meet WP:GNG, topic not notable". This also doesn't require a great deal of cognitive energy to perform. Per your message above, this can be considered as a compounding factor along with the comparison above regarding registered and unregistered users' ability to use Wikipedia. Again, all users can nominate an article for deletion, but only registered users can create articles.

The rationale presented here is intended to promote a discussion, and I request that users please refrain from taking this message and it's examples out of context. Ad hominen arguments aren't particularly constructive. For example, statements such as "this is the only way a person perceives", all-or-none absolutist statements, such as "You're wrong, therefore all of the ideas presented here are nullified", or "Since you want to change the system, and I disagree with you, there's no point to this discussion", statements such as "this is ridiculous" (appealing to ridicule), and other syllogistic and logical fallacies don't promote the notion of improving Wikipedia. These types of statements don't contribute much to discussions in any context, including Wikipedia. The information presented in this message are just examples, nothing more. I'm well aware of the concept of variances, and that it may take some users more time than others to do things, that people use cognitive energy to analyze articles prior to nomination for deletion and in formulating and typing AfD nominations that are actually composed of more text than just brief noun-phrases, etc. The comparisons here are only intended to be examples within the context of this discussion. Furthermore, this isn't my "cause", and I'm not seeking to change the entire AfD nomination and discussion system. It's just a discussion. Northamerica1000 (talk) 17:48, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Please place messages per my above treatise below it, rather than in between the text, to retain the structure of the treatise. Thank you. Northamerica1000 (talk) 17:59, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment from Northamerica1000 (talk) 10:52, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Another example, a problematic nomination: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cloud engineering– (Full disclosure: I contributed to this AfD and also contributed to the article.) Prior to nominating the article for deletion, per the history page for the article, the nominator removed all references from the article, many of which were tertiary sources, but some did serve to verify information within the article. After removing all references, the nominator then referred the article to AfD. Please refer to a prior version of the article here that had stated references, some of which served to verify information in the article and provide information about the topic, and the current version here, which currently has all of the references removed. In particular, note "Cloud Engineering: Somebody Has to Do It" (Requires subscription, but information is present that at the very least verifies information in the article), The Architecture Journal, MSDN Architecture Center, which at the very least serves to verify information in the article, and Cloud Engineering, Symposium. While internet-accessible sources are sparse, it is unfair for a nominator to remove all references from an article, and then propose its deletion. It appears at least possible that the nominator removed all of the references to improve the chances of the article being deleted.

I'd like to hear opinions about how people feel about these types of actions: the removal of all references prior to AfD referral, rather than comments about the quality of the references themselves that I've listed above. I'm already aware that the references I cited above are tertiary in nature, open to multiple interpretations of relevance, that one of them requires purchasing the article, and that one is from a symposium about the topic. However, this reference, "Engineering in the Cloud: An Engineering Software + Services Architecture Forged in Turbulent Times", MSDN Architecture Center seems to have significant enough relevance to at least verify information in the article. Why was it removed entirely from the article by the person who thereafter nominated the article for deletion? In the interests of focusing this discussion constructively, the reference from MSDN Architecture Center is the most worthy of further analysis.

While this particular AfD closed as "no concensus", there are several problems here:
1. The removal of sources that may have been done to promote article deletion,
2. The article now remains in an entirely unsourced state (as of the time of this writing),
3. Some of the sources that the nominator removed are worthy enough as tertiary sources to verify information within the article, which were, unfortunately, removed by the nominator for deletion

It's also worthy to note that the administrator who closed the AfD felt that it was acceptable for people to compare versions of the article, in which the administrator stated, "There appears to be significant concern that the article was trimmed prior to AFD. In my opinion, a link to a prior revisions is plenty to carry on the discussion. However, there is sufficient concern in this discussion to warrent a close with no prejudice to renomination especially after WP:PAYWALL has been clarified to the nominator."

This is concerning, because if nobody had come along and
1. stated that the nominator deleted all of the references in the article, and
2. provided a link to a previous version of the article,

the outcome of the AfD may very well have been an outright article deletion. Fortunately, someone took the time to clarify and correct the faulty nomination in this case. In other cases, unfortunately, this may not be occurring, which can lead to unnecessary article deletion based upon faulty nominations. Again, it appears that at least some improvements and checks-and-balances in the process through which articles are nominated for deletion would prevent these types of problems from occurring. As the AfD nomination process exists now, these types of problems in which articles are stripped of all references, nominated for deletion, and are then retained with all references stripped, which increases their likelihood of re-nomination for deletion, will very likely just continue to occur into the future indefinitely, until they are corrected.

I don't have access to deleted articles, and it is difficult and time-consuming to spend a significant amount of my time researching articles that have already been deleted. Perhaps administrators who have access to deleted articles can provide additional examples here, which would be much easier and would improve this discussion.

Please note that after posting this remark, I will be adding the link "Engineering in the Cloud: An Engineering Software + Services Architecture Forged in Turbulent Times" to the article, at least to the External links section.

Again, please note that these examples are in no manner, way, shape or form meant to be perceived as judgments against the respective editors who nominated the article or editors that contributed to the AfD discussion. I am providing these examples because people above requested specific examples. Please post remarks below this message, rather than within it, to retain the structure of this treatise. Thank you. Northamerica1000 (talk) 10:52, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

I will refer you to in regards to the first point 1 to WP:AGF. If you truly believe that editor to have acted improperly, you should file a report. For the first point 2, those sources were removed for a reason. If you disagree with one or more of their removals, there is nothing preventing you from restoring them. For point 3, if you believe that the source for a given statement is reliable, then please add it to the article again. For your contention that the outcome of the AfD could have been different: A) It wasn't. B)So what if it were? C)That's why people investigate AfDs D)You continue to insist that those kind of checks may not be happening, but you have no reason to believe that because those things demonstrably DO get checked, and the above AfD is a perfect example thereof! VanIsaac_WS^contribs 11:37, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks for your input in this discussion. I cited the above example Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cloud engineering to support my treatise at the top of this section, "Checks and Balances in the Articles for Deletion Nomination Process," regarding improving the AfD nomination process, to retain notable topics on Wikipedia. While I understand your comments about how I can personally improve the article Cloud engineering, it was simply cited as an example per my treatise. People above asked for examples, so I provided some. Northamerica1000 (talk) 11:58, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

NA1k. You don't get it. We absolutely disagree with the very premises of your argument. We disagree that a "keep" !vote is somehow comparable to nominating. We disagree that "delete" is easier to defend than "keep". We disagree that an unsuccessful nomination is an erroneous nomination. We disagree that deletion is in some way fundamentally more drastic than a keep. In short, every argument you make seems to be colored by your inclusionist perspective, but the perspective of the project as a whole has to be neither inclusionist, nor deletionist, but rather neutral. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 11:56, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment: I would prefer that the apparent abbreviation of my user name used above, "NA1K", be discontinued, as it requires people to decode my user name within comments, which may delay this discussion. It is more functional to use my actual user name, "Northamerica1000", in which people don't have to decode, or figure out the abbreviation. Thank you for your consideration. Northamerica1000 (talk) 22:03, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, stop abbreviating his user name. Don't you know that you're deleting letters and deleting things makes them dirty.. dirty... AGGHH! Apostrophe! Must. Scrub. Hands. (ps. Get back on your meds) 101.118.51.252 (talk) 06:50, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Northamerican1000, it seems like the crux of your argument is "Nominators must perform BEFORE before nominating", as a means of checks and balance on the process. I think we can basically summarize what nearly everyone else is saying as follows:

1. BEFORE will never be required practice for nomination of AFD. It's recommended, at best, but not a policy-level requirement.
2. There are several checks and balances, during and post-AFD, that manage the process. In the midst of an AFD, there are means to deal with changes to the article, and allowances for speedy keeps and withdrawn nominations if things change. Following an AFD, there's Deletion review if there was a problem with the deletion process (though, as cautioned, Deletion Review is not "AFD #2"). And there is always WP:REFUND to retrieve deleted content.
3. There are several checks and balances for editors that abuse the AFD process repeatedly, which is handled at WP:RFC/U or for more egregious problems, at WP:AN.

You seem to be looking for a solution that happens before the AFD, but this is pretty much impossible to put into place, not only for how it would impact AFD but also how it runs counter to article creation and editing. Wikipedia is designed on bold editing, making changes first and then coming back to fix them, instead of gaining acceptance first to make changes in the first place. This is necessary to maintain WP as an open wiki, and the AFD process cannot be counter to that. --MASEM (t) 12:20, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• The notion of adding a simple check-box template to verify that users have based their actions in accordance with Wikipedia:Deletion policy, specifically Alternatives to deletion prior to nominating an article for deletion would be very simple, would serve as a reminder for users to at least refer to these policies, and would likely improve Wikipedia's retention of notable topics, which would improve Wikipedia overall. This addition wouldn't be a hindrance whatsoever, simply a very basic requirement to single-click on a check-box prior to nominating an article for deletion, but it's use could significantly benefit the overall Wikipedia project, to provide the sum of all human knowledge (for notable topics) in a digital encyclopedia. Northamerica1000 (talk) 12:46, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

A person acting in bad faith in making a nom can fake checking the box claiming to have done the BEFORE steps and still make the nom; it becomes a triviality and doesn't improve anything. If the nom is clearly wrong because proper BEFORE checking would have revealed the lack of need to delete, then we task it to that user, not to the process. It is implicit that, since this is the first thing spelled out at WP:AFD, making a nom is predicated off of finding alternatives to deletion. It would not make a different on articles going to AFD. --MASEM (t) 13:20, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

That may be, but what do you propose to put feedback into the process to encourage better AfD nominations?  Unscintillating (talk) 18:56, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Probably every argument has been given already but I'd like to say that having nominated a few articles for AfD myself I've found it an incredibly difficult and painful process and have simply stopped doing it. The nomination itself requires research (per WP:BEFORE) and there is a complicated process of adding templates to several pages. Then as nominator I have been subjected to ad hominum attacks, and accused of acting in bad faith or of being too ignorant to understand the article. This is in addition to seeing every argument in Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions used in deletion discussions. Despite the fact that WP claims that Keeps and Deletes are not counted as votes, more than two Keeps, for whatever reasons, usually guarantee a "No Consensus" from the admin who closes the discussion and this is equivalent to a "Keep". Even with a "Delete" outcome, an editor can simply create the page a again and I've seen this happen; a page that was potentially libelous was finally deleted after several tries was simply created again and is as libelous as ever. Without a deletion process WP will eventually turn into a collection of MySpace pages which is why I have gone through this process in the past. The current process puts all the emphasis on WP:BEFORE and ignores WP:BURDEN which to me should be the overriding policy. I do occasionally add a vote to an existing AfD now but I've stopped nominating because at the moment I feel the process is broken and it's not worth the effort and frustration.--RDBury (talk) 14:02, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment from Northamerica1000 (talk) 14:31, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

In the interest of expanding this discussion, and hence making it more comprehensive, does anyone have any other suggestions or ideas regarding the improvement of checks and balances in the Articles for Deletion nomination process? Northamerica1000 (talk) 14:31, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Although I freely admit that I am unabashed inclusionist, a deletion process is an essential component of an online encyclopedia that anyone can edit. There’s no debating that. However, occasionally evaluating the outputs and mechanisms of the process are useful exercise. That’s what’s going on here. To that end, I have a different perspective on the deletion process than that being discussed here. First, our deletion process makes deletion decisions based on the consensus of the few, not the consensus of the community. That is an unfortunate by-product of a volunteer collaborative effort. The deletion process today for experienced editors is tedious, but manageable. As experienced editors participating either regularly or sporadically, we know our way around the process. In the spectrum of articles that might be considered for deletion, the inclusion oriented participants know how to argue and get articles over the appropriate hurdles and the deletion oriented participants know how to argue and create obstacles to those hurdles, often changing the bar to succeed at their deletion goals. There’s nothing unhealthy about this form of consensus generating debate for experienced editors, the assumption being that experienced editors understand the nuances of our policies, guidelines and expected community behaviors. However for a new or inexperienced editor, the process is an onerous one for two reasons. One, the process has literally no imperatives to consider the impact the process on a new/inexperience editor, editors who need mentoring and encouragement. A great many articles that reach AFD are created by this sector of our editor corp. This is a major flaw in my view. Second, for the newcomer, essays and guidelines like WP:ATA, WP:CANVASS and WP:COI are often invoked during AFDs as if they were the ten commandments. Those invocations are often terse without sufficient mentoring rationale. They confuse and discourage newcomers because the newcomers understand consensus behaviors differently. Take WP:CANVASS for example. Out in the real world of collaboration in business, academia, government etc, building consensus for any particular position requires the recruitment of diverse evangelists and stakeholders to weigh-in on your position. Yet, we typically hammer that rational behavior with invocations of WP:CANVASS. I could go on, but the impact of this type of behavior, the failure to take a the mentoring needs of newcomers and inexperienced editors into consideration during the AFD process is detrimental to the strategic goals of the Wikimedia Foundation, especially the expansion of scope and participation in WP. None of the guidelines mentioned above are ill-conceived, but they are misused during debates to the detriment growing the editor corp. --Mike Cline (talk) 15:10, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Comment Wow, I've had 4 AFD closures under scrutiny in this debate now. Does this mean I am doing something wrong...or doing something right? =) --v/r - TP 16:42, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

I am someone who has been in front of this “court” on several occasions. In real life I am a law abiding citizen who has never been in trouble with the law. On Wiklipedia, however, articles I wrote have been removed on several, if not many, occasions (the last one was removed by TP whose name I happened to see here). To this day I still do not understand the rationale for some of those removals.

Oh yes, I must admit that I did not take the time to read all the references provided as reasons, but it seems to me that a system where citizens are expected to become experts in a convoluted system of laws, rules and regulations just in order to stay on the right side of the law is doomed to failure? Ottawahitech (talk) 17:46, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Curb multiple deletion attempts, facilitate undeletion. While the scenario of someone keeping an article by sockpuppetry and gaming, it is unlikely. By the time we've gotten to the third AfD, we should be done. A one-year interval for AfDs doesn't make sense because if an article degenerates over time it can simply be reverted to an old version! The only potential justification to argue further over such articles is if there's been an actual change in policy, in which case a more specialized review process would be in order. Another step we can take is to create a more regular process for allowing users to view the deleted articles. Right now you're supposed to ask some admin at random, see what if anything happens. Why not have a central noticeboard where people get quick service, or a bot that e-mails you the page? Wnt (talk) 20:18, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

It's called WP:REFUND. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 21:31, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

• In response to user Dream Focus comment " I've seen certain people nominating scores of articles almost every day” – I would like to add that some of the people most active in such nominations are not present here to contribute to this discussion. Ottawahitech (talk) 15:50, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

I have brought the discussion here to the attention of a couple of Wikipedians who were involved in the wholesale removal of articles on Wikipedia. I hope they join this discussion. Ottawahitech (talk) 17:36, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

• Unfortunately it appears that those who are involved in wholesale removal of articles on Wikipedia choose not to participate here? Ottawahitech (talk) 15:41, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• This was an excellect brainstorming session - but is anyone doing anything with all the information collected? Is it being tabulated and presented elsewhere at Wikipedia? Ottawahitech (talk) 20:02, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

We don't have a content problem

I still don't see a problem. NA1K showed me some AFDs where badly thought nominations were blocked with near unanimous "keep" arguments. NA1K showed me some AFDs where poorly chosen topics were deleted. I've also seen AFDs with no consensus which will inevitably be revisited until the article is improved. I just don't see how the AFD process is supposedly deleting all this good content by mistake. We don't have a content problem. We might have a community problem. No one likes to see their articles deleted, and new editors are at real risk since they haven't had time to learn our policies. There was a proposal to delay article creation privileges until an editor learned the basics, and most people supported it. But last time I checked it was shut down for reasons I don't understand. Dzlife (talk) 19:19, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

The proposal passed but it was vetoed by developer supervote. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 22:06, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for the link.  Where is the superveto being discussed on Wikipedia?  Thanks, Unscintillating (talk) 23:32, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

I'd like to know that too. (Additional commentary redacted.) --joe decker^{talk to me} 01:17, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Just wanted to note that, while I don't know if it's being discussed on Wikipedia, it has been talked about at mw:Talk:Article creation workflow. I understand that some of the contributors involved are engaging the Wikimedia Foundation directly as well, but I'm not really aware of where they stand with that. I've been cc'ed in a couple of community letters, but that's the extent of it. :) (People interested in the subjects of both creation and deletion may be interested in mw:Article creation workflow as well, as it is intended to help reduce some of the mistakes that new article writers make. Hmm. Wonder if this has been village pumped? (Off to check.....) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 14:03, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment: I would prefer that the apparent abbreviation of my user name used above, "NA1K", be discontinued, as it requires people to decode my user name within comments, which may delay this discussion. It is more functional to use my actual user name, "Northamerica1000", in which people don't have to decode, or figure out the abbreviation. Thank you for your consideration. Northamerica1000 (talk) 22:04, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Agree. We don't have a content problem, we have a process problem. When an article goes to AFD, it is reflective of our community failure to properly train our editors (new and experienced) on what is appropriate for the encyclopedia. Think about deletion as the process of cleaning up litter. You can hire lots of janitors to pick up the litter everyday or you can convince the populace to stop littering. Both take resources (volunteers in the Wp world), but which is more efficient in the long run? Imagine an AFD process whose primary objective was to educate editors on how to create good WP articles. Actual deletion being a secondary objective. The focus would be on using AFD articles as examples of the good and bad. Deletion could and should occur when appropriate, but the AFD itself would have been a step toward the long term improvement of the skills of the editor corp, instead of a sterile keep/delete decision.--Mike Cline (talk) 20:29, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Good idea. We still need AFDs to delete inappropriate material. But maybe we could have a special class of AFD, or a parallel process that flags NEW editors who have written articles that have been nominated for deletion. If we can help them get passed the initial shock of having their material deleted, I'm sure there are lots of great mentors who will help them understand our sourcing requirements. I personally believe the best approach would be to catch them before they create an article, by requiring that they practice some normal editing before trying something like creating an article. Creating an article is advanced stuff. We can't get mad that new users can't do it any more than new users should get mad that we have standards. Dzlife (talk) 20:43, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

An unabashed commercial: User:Mike Cline/Archimedes was deleted and User:Mike Cline/Imagining a new way to look at the question of Notability --Mike Cline (talk) 20:56, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

I know "Articles for Discussion" is a perennial denied proposal, but the fact is, AFDeletion gets lots of eyes, but unless you issue an RFC, trying to get any outside input on a talk page of an article for non-admin actions (merge or redirecting) is near impossible. We should have a venue that says "Ok, this article is bad shape, and I don't think we need a separate article on it, and I want to get the community input on that, with a proper closure with possible need for admin action to complete the consensus". We don't have that, instead a loose structure of things like RFC, centralized discussion, wikiprojects, etc., all which generally fail to attract attention except by those with a strong interest in the article, and thus making merge discussions or the like difficult. It's just that the community continues to reject modifying AFDeletion to AFDiscussion, yes, for good reason, but maybe what's needed is a duplicate process, or managing all the disparate ones. --MASEM (t) 21:42, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

I've never seen that one. I would support it. Any clue as to why it's usually rejected? Redirecting and merging are common outcomes at AFD already, and I see nothing wrong with making the process more amenable to those outcomes. Dzlife (talk) 18:51, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Admins refuse to enforce merge or redirect results of AfD right now, yet other admins force

so there is nothing wrong with objecting to a nomination that says "delete" and then quietly presents only arguments for a merge.

• Comment from Northamerica1000 (talk) 05:30, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

After my provision of examples regarding the improvement of the AfD nomination process, I was hoping to receive responses from User:Roux and User:Jayron32, since these users had requested them. Hopefully after some time occurs, they'll check back here and actually respond, in the interest of improving this discussion. It would be nice to receive further input from other users too, preferably that address matters regarding ideas within this discussion relative to each respective AfD discussion example I have provided, rather than statements that refer to all of them summarily. Northamerica1000 (talk) 05:30, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

• Response to user:VanIsaacs.  Here is the statement from Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jonathan Higgins (2nd nomination), "...in order for the article to exist on Wikipedia, those requesting delete do not have to prove anything, it is upon the people wanting to keep the article to demonstrate it meets the criteria for inclusion. That is how AFD works and always has."  Unscintillating (talk) 14:47, 24 September 2011 (UTC)
• 2nd response to user:VanIsaacs.  WP:N is not content policy.  The WP:Notability of a topic exists independently of either the existence of an article about the topic on Wikipedia, or the content of any such article.  Therefore, the absence of notability cannot be determined by only looking at the article.  Unscintillating (talk) 14:57, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

• • Sure. The Wooster (company) article, which I used my super X-ray vision to look at, was definately an WP:CSD#A7 worthy article. It basically said "Wooster makes model airplanes" and had some basic information about their products, and the fact that they were eventually bought by another model airplane manufacturer. But nowhere did it give any indication of importance or significance that would have made it survive a CSD request had it gone that route instead of AFD. That is, AFD deleted an article that should have been deleted, regardless of how the discussion went. The Leo Goldseed article was in better shape; it at least had more text, but combing through that text there wasn't a lot to say to pass the (very low) standards of A7, that is there wasn't anything in the lengthy biography to indicate why the person may have been an important or significant person. Again, if someone had tagged it for speedy deletion, it was a clear candidate for that. Just because it went through AFD doesn't mean it shouldn't have been deleted. Your other ones didn't seem to get deleted. I still have not yet seen a systemic problem where lots of really good articles are getting deleted through AFD. Also, you should note that you may interest more people in reponding to you if every single post you make here wasn't a wall-of-text. Consiseness is good. --Jayron32 03:15, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

I think that Northamerica1000 has brought up a genuine problem, which some other participants in this discussion have been dismissing a bit too easily. The problem is actually probably worse on PROD than on AfD, but that is a matter for another discussion. However, the suggestion that AfD nominators should be required to state that they have performed BEFORE is unfortunately, like many other apparently good ideas to improve AfD, misguided. While I see some AfDs where I am forced to conclude that the nominator skipped BEFORE entirely, more frequently it has probably been treated as a formality - quick check on first page of GHits, see no obviously reliable sources, move on to checking GNews, box ticked. But if there were three perfectly good sources on page 2, it can look as if BEFORE wasn't performed at all. Or if "Jim Kirk" produces pages of good results - I may easily conclude that the nominator only tested "James Tiberius Kirk".

Of course, the seven days for discussion should catch these, and I think usually does. But "usually" as in "over 50%", not as in "95% or more". I tend to scan rapidly through AfD pages (I have other things to do with most of my time), so I skim past at least as many debates as I look at. But even so, on several occasions, I have looked at a four or five day old discussion and found that a dubious rationale has not been questioned or potential sources not properly checked for. Like Articles for deletion/Abu Ishaq Shami, where sources were not difficult to find but I was the first to do so - over four days after debate had started. We may suppose that each article up for deletion is getting thoroughly checked but I suspect that, for a large minority of them, nobody checks further than a quick look at the article without thinking of the potential for improvement. Of course, not all - probably not even most - of such articles deserve to be kept, but some almost certainly do. PWilkinson (talk) 18:30, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Northamerica1000 states that "it takes much more time and effort to disqualify faulty nominations than it does to post them". This is not a flaw in the process. The criteria for incluson should be far more demanding than the criteria for exclusion.Hobson (talk) 23:04, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

And I disagree with that as well. Right now, we have a faily balanced approach. I think we need to break this down to describe who is responsible for what exactly:

1. Article editors: sourcing; establishing notability; meeting editing standards (eg NPOV, V, etc.)
2. Nominator for deletion: establish policy rationale for deletion; due diligence to determine whether current state of article is endemic to subject, or simply error of editors
3. delete !voters: confirmation of nominator's rationale/research
4. keep !voters: justify interpretation/provide evidence contrary to nom
5. closing admins: investigate !votes to determine whether their conclusions are within policy

There is also a large number of things that are not the responsibility of certain people:

1. Article editors: if they did their job well, there wouldn't be a legitimate AfD, so it' all on them.
2. nominators: do not have the responsibility to search under every possible stone. If sources of notability can only be established by treking with sherpas to a mountaintop monastery's library, it probably isn't actually notable.
3. delete !voters: also do not have the responsibility to search under every possible stone.
4. keep !voters: also do not have the responsibility to find every reference ever written. A single RS is all that's needed.
5. closing admins: do not have to say "keep" or "delete". If the nomination is not clearly supported or refuted, it can simply be a "no consensus".

I would suggest that deficiencies in #1 place an equal burden on everyone else, because unless a nom is spurrious, an AfD doesn't happen without there being deficiencies in the editing; deficiencies by #2 place an equal burden on #3 and #4, with a larger burden on #5; while deficiencies by #3 and #4 place a burden on #5. So if we are going to move forward, I think we need to look at the burden that is placed on the closing admin. He can't do his job effectively without the help of the !voters, so let's also take a look at things that are distincly not helpful in an AfD about notability:

• !voters becoming article editors in the middle of the AfD. If you have a new source, place it in the AfD discussion so everyone can investigate.
• delete !voters who bring in arguments about style, tone, neutrality, etc. in the middle of a notability AfD. An AfD needs to be about specific concerns that are expressed in the nom, not a hodge-podge of deficiencies, each of which may or may not be best solved by deletion.
• keep !voters who bring in a dozen different sources, all of questionable provenance, to prove that a subject is notable. One or two good solid refs from unambiguous RS will establish notability, not 15 articles from high school newspapers, blogs, local radio station interviews, and church bulletins.
• Any contributor who is personally involved with the subject matter. That's when deletion debates become about the subject, not about the article, and it is distinctly unhelpful.

These are my views. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 00:46, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment - Thank you for your input toward this discussion. Northamerica1000 (talk) 10:40, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

I think I was tired, 'cause I kinda rambled a bit there... VanIsaac_WS^contribs 16:26, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

• We have checks and balances. Someone nominates, other users check that the nomination is appropriate and make comments, then an independent user of good standing, usually an admin, checks over the nomination and the comments and makes a decision to keep or delete; further to that we have WP:Deletion review, in which, if someone feels the process wasn't followed appropriately, can raise the issue and experienced users look again at the AfD. We also, before all that happens, have a guideline, WP:Before, which gives guidance and suggestions. While it does happen that someone may not have read or followed the guidance in WP:Before, and that there were few people who commented in the AfD, and/or they did so in a perfunctory manner, and the closing admin was having a bad day and closed inappropriately, and that nobody noticed or cared enough to bring the matter to DRV, we still have the option of WP:Refund and WP:Userfy, along with the notion that someone can start a new article on the topic. In short, not only do we have sufficent checks and balances, but also, it doesn't matter if we don't, because if a topic is genuinely noteworthy, it WILL be created. It is of more concern that some of our most vital, most read articles are in need of improvement, than that a minor topic of little or no interest or significance gets deleted. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 10:46, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment - Some users above have stated that WP:Before is NOT a guideline, like it's just a suggestion. Northamerica1000 (talk) 15:59, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

"Guideline" has some sort of technical meaning on WP, so we're running into a collision of Wiki-usage vs. English-usage. I once had someone ask me whether a set of naming conventions was intended to be a guideline or not. I chose "not" when I saw the guideline process. VanIsaac_WS^contribs 16:26, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment - Thank you for your input toward this discussion. Northamerica1000 (talk) 10:41, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

I am a novice at this type of discussion, and have just started reading this humungous thread which I find most interesting. I actually printed the whole thing to make it easier for me to read when I am not logged on. However, I am afraid that by the time I finish reading this, or even before, this whole discussion will have disappeared somewhere into wikipedia archive's black hole. Is there a way for me to find this discussion later on? Thanks in advance. 71.227.221.41 (talk) 20:27, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Don't worry - Northamerica1000 is very keep at keeping things from being deleted :-) Even if this discussion does eventually disappear from this page, it will still be recorded in the page's archives, so as long as Wikipedia's servers don't burn out, you'll still be able to read it. Yunshui (talk) 20:34, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

• Comment My experience has been that articles are a nuisance to list for deletion, and non-notable articles are kept on the general and unsourced suspicion that they ought to be notable. I would therefore recommend a rule that if after an AfD discussion no one has come up with a source that definitely establishes notability, the person who closes can close as delete. However, there should be some mechanism whereby anyone who re-creates an article can check previous content unless the deleting admin has made it unavailable. This is not censorship. The burden is on the person who creates the article to source it and make sure it's notable. So here's another thing we need to do: we need to make sure every new user knows that material may not be kept unless it is sourced. Wikipedia is full of unsourced and possibly non-notable articles, and AfD is one of the few ways to find out if anyone actually has a justification for keeping them. So in general, the situation is exactly opposite what Northamerica1000 says above, but he does have a point. While the deletion process needs to be made easier, not harder, and the requirements for keeping material need to be stricter, we also need to take steps to make sure good material is not lost forever. But Northamerica1000 states "It's very unlikely that a significant amount of editors will want to devote a great deal of their time correcting these types of hasty nominations for deletion," which is an admission that these articles are actually permanently not up to Wikipedia's standards and would never be improved except they are nominated for deletion. RDBury said "having nominated a few articles for AfD myself I've found it an incredibly difficult and painful process and have simply stopped doing it." Me too. B^e——C_ritical 15:09, 11 October 2011 (UTC)
• I agree with people who say this isn't an issue. WP:BEFORE is already too onerous as it is; means that an AFD nominator has to do more work than the creator of a slapdash article. If something really is notable, it should either be able to survive an AFD or be recreated with more sources Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 04:55, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

AFD checks and balances - Response to those who think we don't have a content problem

I wonder why your experience is so different than mine. Have you ever had any of the articles that you started disappear without your knowledge? Have you seen any come up for debate at AFD? If so, what was your reaction? Ottawahitech (talk) 13:15, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

I was upset. But I soldiered on. If your article is deleted, there are avenues to get it back...DRV, userfication, et.c. But the flip side of this is that if you make WP:BEFORE even more stringent than it already is, you make it very hard to delete something that probably should be deleted. We are already one of the hardest places to delete something among Wikimedia projects; we don't need to get even harder Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 14:50, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for responding to my question, Purplebackpack89. You use terminology that I am not familiar with (DRV, userfication, et.c.) even though I am not completely new at Wikipedia. How do you think a new editor who is not at all familiar with the lingo would react - I hope this is not an exclusive club? Ottawahitech (talk) 15:31, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

If you think this is an exclusive club, you should see what goes on at Wikipedia or some of the smaller Wikis. They are dominated by small cabals of editors who push anybody around who doesn't agree with them 100%. This doesn't even come close to that...it's among the most transparent and keep-ist AFD processes around Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 03:43, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

• Sorry Purplebackpack89, I still cannot make any sense of what you said above, and yes, I feel that this is an exclusive club because a very small unelected minority is the only one participating in this discussion and in the decision making. Ottawahitech (talk) 00:50, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Are newbies encouraged to participate here?

I am a wannabe wikipedian who would like to contribute more to existing articles and to filling in the gaps by creating new missing articles. For me, the constant tagging of articles for deletion is a big distraction - so I thought I would contribute to the discussions here. However...

I have been attempting to get involved in these discussions for well over a month now. One obstacle I have found is the use of jargon I am not familiar with. I would think that others here would also recognize this as a general problem to open and fair discussion. Am I right? Ottawahitech (talk) 19:11, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Anyone is free to participate in any area of discussion on Wikipedia, but certainly some areas of discussion presume more familiarity with Wikipedia policies and guidelines than others. Please feel free to ask questions on my talk page at any time, and there are many other places to get help as well. WP:PRIMER is an excellent overview for beginners. "DRV" refers to Wikipedia:Deletion review or its shortcut WP:DRV. That is kind of an "appeals court" where deletions can be overturned if a mistake was made. "Userfy" refers to Wikipedia:Userfication. An editor whose article was deleted (or any editor interested in that topic) can ask an administrator to create a copy in that editor's userspace - a sandbox, if you will. There, shortcomings of the article can be addressed, and it can be improved and later recreated as an article in main space, or perhaps useful content can be merged into another article. Many administrators are happy to userfy material if it has any reasonable prospect of developing into an acceptable article. Hope this helps. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 19:34, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks for trying to help me, Cullen328. I checked the links you referred me to and counted 78 pages (17+56+5) you suggest I read so that I know enough to join the discussion here? Ottawahitech (talk) 21:29, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

I see that the articles that "may have been hastily deleted" were both nominated by me (I had a username change from Joe Chill to SL93). Nice. SL93 (talk) 00:23, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Bold, revert, discuss

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Today I changed the capitalisation on this page so use "Afd" instead of "AfD". Yes, I know that it has always been "AfD, but let me present my case.

The title of this page is "Wikipedia:Articles for deletion". That akes for "Articles for deletion" = "Afd". Also, there is no reason Afd should be different from Cfd and Tfd. The fact that there the"d" stands for "discussion" obviously is of not import.

The "argument" that most people use "AfD" is a circular one, and can therefore not be accepted. People use "AfD", because that is what it used to say here.

It is more than likely that the capitalisation with a capital "D" is a result of the American tendency to capitalise all nouns in titles. But see Wikipedia:Article_titles#Article_title_format and compare Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Capital_letters#Section_headings that on Wikipedia we should capitalise only proper nouns. This edit actually fixes this old transgession of these WP:MoS guidelines.

My proposal: to confirm my bold move and use the logical, correct, and consistent capitalisation: "Afd". Debresser (talk) 13:15, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

There is no reason I can see to change the capitalization; both are equally sensible and logical. In general template names are more or less arbitrary strings that identify the template. Unless there is some genuine confusion about the capital D, we should just leave it as is. Template:Tfd has a redirect Template:TfD, so both work. Can you point to any complaints by users that the capital D in AfD caused problems? — Carl (CBM · talk) 13:41, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

(ec) Actually, WP:Redirects for discussion is referred to as RfD. In any case capitalization doesn't seem to be the problem we have with this process (see above), the MOS won't apply in letter to our project pages, and looking at the spirit of it, there are passages where we try to more and more discourage people from continuously trying to fix and standardize usage in article space according to their own logic which invariably will collide with someone else's, so no problem in leaving the project pages inconsistent as well and do something else (fwiw, I prefer the double cap).--Tikiwont (talk) 13:55, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

The logical name would be "AFD" etc. (and moving is not out of the question, the whole AfD structure has been moved, I think, three times already, including changing namespace twice, and changing form VfD to AfD. Rich Farmbrough, 14:10, 11 December 2011 (UTC).

Reply to Tikiwont. Then perhaps Rfd should also be referred to as Rfd, not RfD. :) Thanks for your reply. I agree that capitalisation is not a problem, but I also think we should make an effort to do things the best way possible, and in my argumented opinion that would mean using "Afd". Debresser (talk) 14:43, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Leave at AfD. If anything, it should be "AFD" before "Afd". This isn't an article and doesn't need to follow any MoS or WP:TITLE guidelines. After all, you would use "afd" if you were to follow capitalization based on first letter, because it is "articles for deletion" and not a proper noun. We use "AFD" because "afd" is not obvious enough, especially if it matches a real word like "prod" or "gan". If this proposal wants to change the way we abbreviate all Wikipedia: discussion pages, then it needs to include them all, not just AfDs. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 14:56, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Dbresser is only suggesting that AfD follow the style of Tfd and Cfd. But certainly moving to XFD would be slightly wider ranging. Rich Farmbrough, 15:37, 11 December 2011 (UTC).

• Contra Debresser, since we're all using specific idiomatic terms instead of standard capitalization anyways, I prefer to retain the difference in "for discussion" and "for Deletion". Jclemens (talk) 15:39, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

  As we have commented far and wide, the name is unfortunate, it should probably be "... for deletion discussion" since "deletion" pre-judges the issue, and "discussion" is too general. Rich Farmbrough, 18:15, 11 December 2011 (UTC).
  

• Move to WP:SHeD (ok, not really). Anomie⚔ 15:44, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
• Leave at AfD or change to AFD. I alternate between the two myself, but have never used Afd, which seems counter-intuitive to me. AFD is the most logical, in that the vast majority of most initialisms are all caps, but if people would rather preserve the status quo, I'm fine with that as well. jcgoble3 (talk) 16:31, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
• Status quo per Anomie. It's a bit ridiculous that we're even wasting time on something like this. It reminds me of the US House of Representatives debating on whether to reaffirm that "In God We Trust" is the official motto while the country was a few days away from defaulting on their debt. —SW— ^talk 17:11, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Reply to Snottywong. If it is of so small importance, then why was my change here reverted twice with a few hours after I made it? Seems to be that people care about it more than they show. Or would it be a matter of WP:ILIKEIT? Btw, nice signature! Debresser (talk) 17:15, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

The same thing would happen (i.e. someone would revert me) if I replaced every instance of "AfD" with "Pork chop sandwiches". What's your point? The fact that someone reverted your silly edit doesn't prove that the capitalization is important, it only proves that your edit was silly. —SW— ^confess 06:52, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

• Keep as AfD. "AfD" is the abbreviation everyone uses, in discussions and in the project namespace, throughout the project. This is the de facto convention and I see no compelling reason to change it. Dcoetzee 17:23, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

It is convention only by force of habit. I see very little good arguments here, only WP:IDONTLIKEIT. The commentary after this one is the example par excellence of that. Do you, or anybody else, have any arguments? Debresser (talk) 17:31, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

You aren't making a strong case for yourself either, except WP:ILIKEIT (Which is an AfD argument, not a general Wikipedia guideline for everything). In fact, you are the one who changed CFD. And again, it should be "afd" by your arguments, because "articles" is not capitalized per se. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 17:46, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

It looks silly, unnatural, and has no upsides. That's all the argument necessary to show this is a contentious waste of time and therefore shouldn't happen. Your non-standard grammar crusade can stop now. --erachima talk 17:47, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

• Keep it at AfD or go to AFD, "Afd" looks all af'd up. --erachima talk 17:27, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
• Move to AFD while acronyms like "MoS" are not scarce, the style "MOS" is simpler and more widely used. Rich Farmbrough, 18:28, 11 December 2011 (UTC).
  
• Who cares? This is not worthy of discussion, this is just being lamely anal. WP:FUCK for guidance on something like this. D O N D E groovily Talk to me 18:56, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
  • Shouldn't that be WP:Fuck? At any rate, I agree. What a useless thing to open a discussion about. Resolute 20:07, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
• Keep at Afd, unless we want to start moving not only the 264188 AfD pages, but also the 3645 TfD pages, the 2856 FfD pages, the 2626 CfD pages, the 1957 RfD pages, the 10046 MfD pages, and the 939 SfD pages. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 19:26, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
• For fuck's sake, leave it alone. A convention exists; take your foolish consistency somewhere else. —chaos5023 (talk) 20:40, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
• "AfD" (or perhaps "AFD"). It is conventional to capitalise the most important words in a title. For example, "front of house" (in the world of theatre) is abbreviated "FoH" or "FOH", never "Foh". Same with "articles for deletion": it should be called "AfD" or "AFD", not "Afd". 124.168.87.221 (talk) 05:17, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
• AfD. jorgenev (t|c|s)
• WP:SHED. A finer example has never been provided. I'm actually thinking about adding this to the essay. Also, WP:DGAF causa sui (talk) 06:42, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
• Status Quo Inertia is an entirely valid argument when the issue is such a triviality. "Afd" is rarely used. This is silly bikeshedding. --Cybercobra (talk) 08:48, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
• Comment According to Garner's Modern American Usage [6] initialisms are usually all caps in American English and one capital then lowercase in British English. So this may be an Engvar issue, as well. In any case, I do support moving it from AfD. Mark Arsten (talk) 23:16, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Ban proposal

• Anyone who further contributes to the above thread will be banned.
• Support. As proposer. Fences&Windows 23:40, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support. I don't really have much to say about the above thread except that, folks, this isn't worth anybody's time. Find something more important to discuss. I, Jethrobot ^{drop me a line} (note: not a bot!) 23:59, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
• Ban every editor who makes a ban proposal here, as well as any editor who continues the above discussion. Ban me too, as well as everyone who disagrees with me. Now, let's write or improve some encyclopedia articles. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 01:19, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
• Sure - Haven't read a thing but looks good to me. I'm sure we can trust him with the spatula, no reason to oppose. LoveUxoxo (talk) 01:30, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
• BJAODN causa sui (talk) 02:40, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
• Nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:19, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support Cullen, add as example to WP:BIKE Bulwersator (talk) 12:26, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Orphaned page appears junk

Hi, FYI someone might want to wipe Talk:Uranus explorer 1 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.160.210.251 (talk) 04:09, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

 Done. In the future, you can tag things like that for "speedy" deletion per the instructions at WP:CSD. --Jayron32 06:54, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I hate WP:BEFORE

I do like the purpose behind it, but I absolutely hate how it is misused. In multiple AfDs where I couldn't find significant coverage and someone else could, that person has accused me of not following WP:BEFORE. I say in all of my nominations that I searched for sources so I'm not sure if I'm being called a liar. SL93 (talk) 00:06, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Do not be bothered by it. The accusation is just proof that the other one has no proper arguments. Night of the Big Wind _talk 00:23, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

• If other contributors find good references that substantiate that a topic is, after all, notable, that is a supremely "proper argument" for keeping the article. So, sorry, if SL93 routinely finds they failed to find good RS other contributors could find I suggest worrying about this is valid. Geo Swan (talk) 07:10, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

If you couldn't find stuff after trying, but someone else could, maybe you should ask 'em how they did it. There's an art to searching, and if you're trying, you should be encouraged to try better, not griped at for failing. Jclemens (talk) 01:31, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Though BEFORE is not meant to require a detailed search of every possible index. A good BEFORE search hits the various Google facets and tries a few approaches. If searching for topics for an article require specific search terms or an atypical search engine, that's not the nominator failing BEFORE, nor expected for the nominator to improve their search habits. Remember, BEFORE is not required, and we cannot put specific onuses on a process that can require a lot of trial and error. --MASEM (t) 01:38, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

• I am going to disagree, in part, with User:Masem and User:Night of the Big Wind. No one should imply bad faith on your part if you did your best to search for references that would substantiate that a topic was notable, prior to nominating an article that seemed weak to you. But a contentious {{afd}} can use up dozens of hours of other volunteers time. Individuals who can't be bothered performing a web search, prior to nominating an article for deletion, really do impose a costly burden on the project. And I am afraid that if you have routinely made good faith efforts to find good references, only to find your good faith efforts failed, and other contributors were able to find good references you missed that established topic's notability, then sorry, that implies you too have imposed a considerable and avoidable burden on the project.

  If you really are finding your good faith efforts to search for the references that would support that a topic was notable have fallen short, then let me ask you if you really think continuing to nominate articles is a good idea -- at least until you improve your web searching skills?

  I'll offer you a couple of simple pointers. Forgive me if I am repeating things you already know.

1. Google and other search engines allow multi-word terms to be grouped together with quote marks -- so the words in the term only trigger a hit when they occur in that sequence.
2. The keyword OR, or a pipe symbol, is used as the boolean operator "OR" -- allowing searches with alternatives.
3. preceding a term with a dash reverses the meaning of that term. So -wikipedia', for instance would filter out hits to pages that include the word "wikipedia".
4. You can use the "site:" keyword to restrict a search to a domain. "site:nytimes.com" directs google to only search pages under the nytimes.com domain. Similarly "site:mil OR site:gov" is useful for searching for public domain images. Geo Swan (talk) 07:04, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

• Its far too easy to nominate something for deletion. Most people who send things to AFD, go around nominating a lot of things in a short period of time. At Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Haunt (video game), once you found a lot of things appearing in a Google news archive search results for "Haunt" "and "video game", instead of nominating it for deletion, you should've tried to narrow down the search to find what you were looking for. Add in the name of the company that produces it, or the name of anyone notable attached to it, or check the Wikiproject for video games and use their search through reliable sources for video game articles, as someone of course did, easily finding significant coverage in them. I'm going to go request a bot for that, so that AFDs will check the type of article being nominated, and add in a link to the RS search for the relevant Wikiproject. Dream Focus 07:28, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
• I have seen user nominate articles for speedies and then at Afd while with the smallest effort they could have found some good sources and additional interesting facts. And in my opinion an editor has the obligation to check such things before nominating an article for deletion. In other words, there are editors for whom deletion is the default, and that is why we need WP:BEFORE. Such editors should be WP:TROUTed with that guideline a few times, until they get the point. Nominating for deletion is easier, but The Right Thing To Do is to do your homework first. Debresser (talk) 08:14, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
  • Every single thing that every editor does here ought to be for the purpose of improving this encyclopedia. Following our BEFORE recommendation helps reduce the chance that articles on notable topics will be nominated for deletion inappropriately. Of course, various editor's skills will differ in finding reliable sources. That is why tips about how sources were found, and how sources may be found in similar future cases, are so useful to productive editors. In my experience, simply reconfiguring Google search terms to a variety of plausible possibilities often yields a far wider range of potential reliable sources than a search based only on the current article title. No reasonable editor ought to advocate deleting an article on a notable topic when sources can be easily found and added to the article. I expand, reference and improve articles all the time, but I also advocate deleting articles on non-notable topics. Keeping is always better than deleting whenever keeping is a viable option. BEFORE is a tool that helps train all editors participating in deletion discussions about the reasonable alternatives to deletion, so that AfD debates are less acrimonious and based more on genuine consensus. Take time to search, and improve and expand articles as the first option. If you truly believe, based on a sincere and skilled search, that the topis isn't notable, then nominate the article for deletion. If other editors rapidly discover source showing notablity, then please refine your search skills before nominating other articles for deletion. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 08:38, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Why should I refine my search skills? Most articles that I nominate for deletion are deleted. Most times the keepers throw trivial mentions in my face, but sometimes they are significant coverage. SL93 (talk) 13:14, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

What SL93's concern is exactly why BEFORE can't be enforceable. If an article fails to explain anything about its notability, and provides little information to make a narrowed or specific engine search for sources, there is no way we can expect the nominator to reasonably find any, even if, by doing one little tweak on search terms, the sources become obvious. Remember, anyone can nominate any article they believe fails notability, they need not be an expert in that field, and thus we cannot expect them to be expert searchers for information in that field. What might be easier for a well-versed editor in that field to find may be very obscure. Also remember: we're talking "reliable" sources, as well, and that adds complexity to a search that we cannot expect of a nominator: the nominator should be aware what consistutes for RS for the article's field, but it likely is more the problem of trying to identify any useful results from hundreds of blog posts and forum messages. Remember, if literally hundreds of reliable sources really do exists, and can be shown by explaining how to properly search for them, and everyone goes "obvious keep", you'll likely get a snow close on the AFD.

The only actually that we can take against an editor based on BEFORE if they have nominated dozens of articles where they claim there are no sources, but each time, they are easily found by a simple, non-specific search (eg plopping the name of the article into google without additional search terms); in otherwords, we can easily discount any AGF they had in making the nomination. When an editor, like SL93 here, claims to have made that simple search and not found anything, and this can be verified, that's a good-faith adherence to BEFORE, and we cannot criticize such editors for not taking that step. That's the only objective concept that we can make from BEFORE in terms of enforceable behavior, using that as a means to stop editors that refuse to do any type of BEFORE work from being disruptive. --MASEM (t) 13:36, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

"Why should I refine my search skills?" Because, while there are plenty of articles that ought to be deleted, deleting an article that shouldn't have been deleted is not cool. AfD is not an arcade game for which you're trying to get the high score. Burdening other editors with doing work you could have done yourself is a waste of resources. Granted, it doesn't seem as if you are nominating articles which end up being kept with any unreasonable regularity (only about a 5-10% error rate), but there's always room for improvement. —SW— ^babble 18:05, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

What should not be happening is putting the onus on finding sources on the person that wants to delete the article. In a good faith nomination, the editors sees the article, believes its on a non-notable subject, has done an initial search pass to find that sources are not prevailing to suggest notability, and then puts the article to AFD. If finding the articles requires somewhat specialized knowledge in that field, we cannot expect the nominator to necessarily take those steps. Take the above case of the Haunt video game. I know, from the VG project, that putting the name of a game with a developer is likely to narrow down sources fast, and that is certainly true here (I found at least one good source from gnews with that). But someone that never deals with contemporary topics may not know about that search. Failing to find the game's mention with a general google search across web/news/scholar is not failing anything; that's the minimum that we can reasonably expect. --MASEM (t) 16:08, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Every AfD nominator has failures. Did I ever say that it was cool to delete notable articles or that AfD is like a video game? SL93 (talk) 17:24, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Referring to other AfD participants as "the keepers" who "throw trivial mentions in my face" seems like an adversarial attitude to have, and gives me the feeling that you are at least partially trying to "win" something. —SW— ^babble 18:05, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

So you're assuming bad faith on my part. By keepers, I am only referring to people who !vote keep. It is throwing trivial mentions in my face when they are like "I found plenty of coverage. Follow WP:BEFORE." SL93 (talk) 18:21, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

WP:BEFORE is not a policy or even a guideline. There are several good reasons why it's not, and why bringing it up in an AfD debate is usually a crap argument. Firstly, it reverses the burden of evidence; I've seen "arguments" along the lines of "Keep- nominator hasn't explained how they followed BEFORE". But it's not up to the nominator to jump through hoops, it's up to the people defending the article to find the material that justifies it. Secondly, it actually punishes nominators who are diligent in evaluating sources beforehand. How often do we see things like "Keep- if nominator had followed BEFORE they'd have found this google search that matches some or all of the words in the article title", when in fact the nominator might have seen those same matches already and rejected them as junk. Thirdly, it's not clear how much thoroughness or specialist knowledge the nominator needs to have. Is "Keep- Per BEFORE, the nominator should have known to combine the article title with the manufacturer's name and year of release" really fair? Do you see the common thread running through all these criticisms? BEFORE is used as a weapon to attack nominators, to try to paint them as lazy and incompetent, and these attacks are seldom accurate or fair. Its contribution the the hostile battleground atmosphere at AfD far exceeds the value of the good advice it contains. That is why WP:BEFORE is not, should not, and will never be enforceable. Reyk _YO! 01:56, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Trying to nominate for AfD

I have completed the first stage of nominating Twilight of the Dead for deletion, but cannot move on because there is already an unrelated page with the same name that was deleted in 2007 (see: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Twilight of the Dead. I seem to remember that there is a procedure for nominating an article for a second time, but I can't find details. However, this is not strictly appropriate as this is not the same article or subject, just the same title. If someone can point me in the right direction (or better yet, complete the process for me) I'd be very grateful. (Incidentally, my grounds for nomination are that this appears to be a non-notable single with no evidence provided of notability either in the article itself, or in the article Misfits (band) and Misfits discography.) Emeraude (talk) 15:46, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Just create a new nomination page at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Twilight of the Dead (2nd nomination). The fact that the subject of the article is different from the one discussed in 2007 doesn't mean you have to do anything special. Hut 8.5 17:38, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Many thanks. I knew it was something simple. Job done. Emeraude (talk) 18:17, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Help requested with article on Robert California

I am nominating the article on the fictional character Robert California for deletion. This is done in response to one of the five {{PROD}}s contested on 13 January by 3:21:14:20: is key (talk · contribs); I have completed step I and request help with the remaining steps in the nomination process. Thanks in advance. 68.165.77.175 (talk) 06:53, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

 Done Nomination page created. I will leave it to you to notify the authors. jcgoble3 (talk) 17:21, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Because of the imminent 1/18 blackout...

There will only be a few AfDs listed on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2012 January 18 that day :) --MuZemike 12:22, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Note the blackout doesn't start until 05:00 UTC, so it will still be possible to nominate articles for five hours. Hut 8.5 14:22, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

And we still ended up with 47 - quite manageable, by most standards. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 16:31, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Blackout and AFD closures

I saw that Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nancy Nasrallah was closed when it popped up on my watchlist. It was non-admin closed by User:Sprinting faster. Aren't these AFDs supposed to be extended by 1 day? -- Whpq (talk) 18:38, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, they were supposed to be extended, but as there wasn't really any opposing view I dont think it matters. If you want to contest it, take it to DRV. Gaijin42 (talk) 19:35, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

It's pretty clear cut and an extra day won't likely affect the outcome. -- Whpq (talk) 20:45, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

deletion for a non article!!

this article here Obscenity the other side of Aisha has nothing to do to be an article in wikipedia with lack on sources and useless!. So would be better to delete it to keep wikipedia clean. thank you.

--Neogeolegend (talk) 01:16, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

If you want to nominate the page for deletion follow the instructions here. This page is not part of the AfD process. Hut 8.5 09:02, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

Note that the user was blocked for edit warring on this very article. Nothing to see here. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 20:15, 24 January 2012 (UTC)